Mental health services
Reaching out is the hard part. Make sure it lands
For most people, contacting a mental health service is the hardest thing they will do that week, and they have usually talked themselves into it once. A call that rings out is not a lost enquiry, it is somebody who may not try again. We make sure every approach gets a reply, with anything indicating risk routed straight to a human and never to an automation.
The outcome
Everyone who reaches out gets an answer
Most services do not have an awareness problem so much as a first-contact problem. People make contact once, often at an odd hour, often by a route nobody is watching, and if nothing comes back they frequently do not repeat it. Closing that gap means more of the people who already found you actually start treatment, which is a better use of effort than reaching more people who will meet the same silence.
What we put in
- Risk goes to a human, immediately and always
- This is configured before anything else. Any contact indicating risk is routed straight to your on-call arrangements and to the appropriate services. It is never handled by an automation, never queued, and never held until office hours.
- Every approach acknowledged, whatever the hour
- Calls, forms and messages get a real acknowledgement rather than silence, saying what happens next and when. Most contact arrives outside working hours, which is exactly when it is least likely to be answered.
- Waiting lists that do not feel like silence
- If there is a wait, people cope with it far better when they know where they stand. Keeping in contact through the wait reduces the number who quietly disappear before a first session.
- Discretion built into the handling
- Enquiry records capture what is needed to arrange an appointment and no more. Who can see what is set deliberately rather than left at defaults, and everything sits in accounts you control.
- Careful, defensible language
- What a service publishes should describe what it is, who it is for and what a first appointment involves. We check yours against that: no outcome promises, no claims about what therapy will achieve for someone, nothing that would trouble a regulator or a reader.
What it’s worth
What it is worth, plainly
The clinical case and the commercial case point the same way here, which is not always true. People who get a reply start treatment. Improving first-contact response raises both the number of people you help and the number of assessments you complete, from demand you are already receiving and already paying to attract.
Stated the other way round: a service losing several first contacts a week to an unanswered phone loses both the clinical outcome and the fee, and has no record that it happened. That is the part worth fixing before anything is spent on reaching more people.
How it’s built
You own it, not us
The number, the records, the client data and the automations sit in accounts in your organisation's name. Nothing switches off if you stop working with us and nothing has to be exported. Given how sensitive this data is, it should never sit inside an agency's tooling, and with us it does not.
- Registered to your businessThe numbers, the database, the automations, the website and every call record sit in accounts in your organisation's name.
- We hold access, not ownershipOur route in is a permission you grant, and one you can withdraw without anything stopping.
- If we stop working togetherThe system keeps running and nothing has to be exported, because none of it was ever somewhere else.
What it takes
How to start
Run a free Leak Check. It scores what someone experiences when they try to make contact: whether the phone is answered, what happens to an evening enquiry, and how long a message waits. You keep the findings whether or not you work with us.
What owners ask first
Would an automated system ever handle someone in crisis?
No, and this is configured before anything else goes live. Any contact indicating risk routes immediately to a human under your on-call arrangements and to the appropriate services. It is never queued, never held until office hours, and never answered by an automation. If a service cannot be set up that way, we do not set it up.
Is it appropriate to automate anything in a mental health service?
Automation belongs in the administrative layer only: acknowledging that someone has been in touch, arranging an appointment, sending a reminder, keeping someone informed while they wait. It replaces silence, not clinical judgement, and everything clinical stays with your team.
How is client information kept confidential?
Enquiry handling captures what is needed to arrange an appointment and nothing more, access is set deliberately rather than left at defaults, and the data sits in accounts your organisation controls. We go through exactly what is captured and who can see it during the Leak Check, before anything is built.
What can a therapy service say in its advertising?
Describe the service, who it is for, the registration your clinicians hold and what a first appointment involves. Avoid promising outcomes or recovery. Registration bodies and the Advertising Standards Authority both take a dim view of outcome claims, and in practice they convert less well than a clear, calm description of what actually happens.
We are a small practice with a waiting list. Is this still relevant?
Often more so. A waiting list makes first contact more important rather than less, because the people on it are the ones most likely to disappear if they hear nothing. Keeping contact through the wait is usually the highest value change available to a small practice.
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Find out what's recoverable in your clinic
We mystery-shop your clinic the way a patient would, by search, phone and web form, then show you the patients you could be winning. Scored on three things: are you found, is the enquiry answered, does anyone chase it.